By the death of Harun in 809, Nicephorus was left free to deal with the Bulgarian king, Krum, who was harassing his northern frontiers.
After the Turks were driven from the city in 1878, it was in many respects modernized; but something of its former character is preserved in the ancient Turkish palace, mosque and fountain, the maze of winding alleys and picturesque houses in the older quarters, and, on market days, by the medley of peasant costumes - Bulgarian, Albanian and Rumanian, as well as Servian.
The large number of Slavonic local names in Albania, even in districts where no trace of a Slavonic population exists, bears witness to the extensive Servian and Bulgarian immigrations in the early middle ages, but the original inhabitants gradually ousted or assimilated the invaders.
A new Bulgarian dynasty, that of Shishman, was founded at Ochrida after the death of Simeon.
Shishman's son Samuel (976-1014) captured Durazzo; he extended his sway over a great part of the Balkan Peninsula, but was eventually defeated in 1014 by the emperor Basil II., who put out the eyes of 1.5,000 Bulgarian prisoners.
